Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair. ~Kahlil Gibran
The spirituality of our lives may or may not be the same, but if you Love your Higher Power and try to live with kindness...we have a kindred spirit.

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Know what is scarier than finding a Black Widow in your storage unit?

Finding a black widow spider and her egg sack.... to be continued if I survive! Off to mail a package, and spray the daylights and black widow(hopefully the only one) to infinity and beyond!

Didn''t mean to tease, but didn't want anyone worrying if I don't post till Monday. Still now that you know, I wouldn't mind you saying a prayer for me to drive the beast and her progeny out! (Actually, I took care of the egg case already.) But wasn't dressed for battle when I discovered the spider under a rolling hand cart. Flip flops not being my considered best footwear for battling poisonous spiders. Which turned out to be against more than I'd hoped.

Within minutes of getting the door open on the unit, out of the corner of my eye, (Thank you, Lord) I caught a furtive movement on the back of the ladderback chair I keep over there. I'd stopped at the store and had a new broom(to sweep clean with) and a gigantic can of bug spray for crawling insects. Grandma was ready to bring it on!

They say a brave soul dies but once, but a coward dies a thousand deaths. To that I'd like to add that an old lady who gets the creeps from spiders and yet loved Eight Legged Freaks, and Arachnophobia(both great spider movies) will suffer at least 500 imaginary attacks during the scourging of a storage unit. I only had one real battle today, and that was with a male black widow.

Before leaving to do battle, I mailed my witch rug to its new owner. She had been out of town, I'm not just that tardy about getting it into the mail. Went to the store to stock up on spider nuking items, and had googled for:
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/black_widow_spider_bite/article_em.htm#Black%20Widow%20Spider%20Bite%20Overview Black Widow Spider Bite SymptomsThe black widow spider produces a protein venom that affects the victim's nervous system. This neurotoxic protein is one of the most potent venoms secreted by an animal. Some people are slightly affected by the venom, but others may have a severe response. The first symptom is acute pain at the site of the bite, although there may only be a minimal local reaction. Symptoms usually start within 20 minutes to one hour after the bite. There are several pages of info, and none of it made me feel better. Who is most vulnerable? Elderly and children are the most likely to die from such a bite.

Now some- THATS GOOD, they aren't very likely to bite humans, NO THATS BAD unless they are tending an egg sac... THATS GOOD I smooshed to smitherins the egg sack several days ago, NO THATS BAD WITH NO SIGHT OF THE FEMALE BUT A SIGHTING OF A MALE..... BTW males can mate several times before being devoured by the female. Me, Oh My, why did I have to google about them?

In the end, it was the TX heat that forced me to abandon my Search and Destroy mission for today. We are supposed to get a cold front in tomorrow, but today after 45 minutes in blazing humid sunlight, I felt dizzy and weak. She who runs away, lives to fight another day. After returning home, I showered and put every stitch I was wearing into the washer. Now I can relax and work on finishing my ATC cards for October 1st.I really would appreciate your prayers of protection for my next foray into the storage unit early next week.

4 comments:

Oh my, I would be freaking out. We have huge clumsy Orb spiders at the barn and sometimes on the outside of the house but nothing as poisonous as the Black Widow spiders. Please do be careful. Do you normally have them in your area?

Your prayer request has been heard and I'll pray that you be protected Cotton Eyed Jo. The movie video was a nice touch. JB

Nature by the Numbers

About Me

Personal lifetime record for dragonfly landings in one day...46. If you'd like to try it yourself, our dragonflies prefer wet fingers and try not to look at them directly until they are settled. Good luck, it is the lightest possible touch and the one type of magic that comes into my life with regularity. So guess that means, it's not magic. ;)